Male Perpetrators

Lusby, Stephanie. 2017. "Securitisation, Development and the Invisibility of Gender." In Transformations of Gender in Melanesia, edited by Macintyre Martha and Spark Ceridwen, 23-44. Canberra: ANU Press.

Author: Stephanie Lusby

Annotation:

"Discussions of violence are ubiquitous in, and with regard to, Papua New Guinea. In this chapter, I discuss how persistent broader contexts of legitimised violence shape efforts to destabilise particular patterns of violence, namely, male violence against women. Looking at the perspectives of men working in the security industry in PNG, I argue that the increased traction and centrality of discourses of securitisation in the name of national development allows violence against men accused of criminal or anti-social behaviour to persist. Critically, the silences around the gendered dimensions of violence between men excused as ‘disciplinary’ produces double standards that are unhelpful to efforts to improve gender equality. Here, I seek to illustrate that narratives of discipline and security form a continuum in discussions of violence, highlighting the need for politicised and holistic approaches to gender in violence interventions" (Lusby, 2017, p. 23).

Munro, Brenna. 2016. “Locating ‘Queer’ in Contemporary Writing of Love and War in Nigeria.” Research in African Literatures 47 (2): 121–38.

Author: Brenna Munro

Abstract:

The child soldier novel is not usually read in terms of sexuality; however, sexual trauma, sex between men and boys, and the production of damaged masculinities are central to representations of the boy soldier in contem- porary writing about war from Nigeria, including Chris Abani’s Song for Night (2007), Uzodinma Iweala’s Beasts of No Nation (2005), and Chimamanda Adichie’s Half of a Yellow Sun (2006). The queer gures of the perverse adult military man and the violated and violating boy soldier emerge in complex relation to contemporary representations of the Nigerian gay man—and all of these texts negotiate the politics of sex and race across multiple reading publics. Jude Dibia’s gay character Adrian in Walking with Shadows (2005) asserts legibility and respectability in sharp contrast to the queer subjectivi- ties of war writing, for example, yet all of these texts dramatize negotiations with stigma as it circulates across representations of sexuality.

Hsu, Hsin-Ping. 2009. “How Does Fear of Sexual Harassment on Transit Affect Women’s Use of Transit?” In Women’s Issues in Transportation - Summary of the 4th International Conference. Vol. 2. Irvine, California: Transportation Research Board.

Author: Hsin-Ping Hsu

Abstract:

The purpose of this study is to understand how women’s fear of sexual harassment on transit changes their transit use and travel behavior. The study, which employed a qualitative research approach, found that cultural differences are important to women’s perceptions of sexual harassment and women’s attitudes about adequate policy responses. Yet cultural differences are not as important as the availability of a car in influencing how women modify their use of transit in response to sexual harassment. Thus, a feasible and effective policy addressing this issue should take the cultural context into consideration.

Fear of victimization and crime are important concerns for women in cities around the world, and this fear is provoked through encounters with men in public space because they are “unpredictable, potentially uncontrollable and hence threatening.” The South Asian literature has focused more on the subordinate role of women in Indian society and the workplace than on gender-based crime (referred to as “Eve teasing”) in the public spaces and transportation systems in South Asia. The objective of this paper is to elicit information on sexual harassment faced by women commuters in Chennai, India. The study found 66% of the surveyed respondents had been sexually harassed while commuting. Many of the respondents first encountered sexual harassment during their adolescent years. Very few (5% or less) found any of the modal choices to be best. The largest number of women (more than 40%) rated their worst harassment experiences to be in buses and trains with no separate sections for women. The paper offers other findings on the nature and frequency of sexual harassment and suggestions to address these incidents. (Abstract from original source)

Engaging men is a critical component in efforts to reduce intimate partner violence (IPV). Little is known regarding men’s perspectives of approaches that challenge inequitable gender norms, particularly in settings impacted by armed conflict. This article describes men’s experiences with a women’s empowerment program and highlights men’s perceptions of gender norms, poverty and armed conflict, as they relate to achieving programmatic goals. Data are from 32 Ivorian men who participated in indepth interviews in 2012. Interviews were undertaken as part of an intervention that combined gender dialogue groups for both women and their male partners with women’s only village savings and loans programs to reduce IPV against women. Findings suggested that in the context of armed conflict, traditional gender norms and economic stressors experienced by men challenged fulfillment of gender roles and threatened men’s sense of masculinity. Men who participated in gender dialogue groups discussed their acceptance of programming and identified improvements in their relationships with their female partners. These men further discussed increased financial planning along with their partners, and attributed such increases to the intervention. Addressing men’s perceptions of masculinity, poverty and armed conflict may be key components to reduce men’s violence against women in conflict-affected settings.

During the Rwandan genocide sexual violence was used as a weapon of war to ravage a people. Women were tortured psychologically, physically and emotionally. For some women the “dark carnival” of the genocide has not ended. Living side by sidewith the men who committed violence against them, they must confront their past every day. This Article explores how, post-genocide, the country has come to adjudicate these crimes in gacaca. Gacaca is a unique method of transitional justice, one that calls upon traditional roots, bringing community members together to find the truth of what happened during the genocide and punish those who perpetrated violence. One scholar calls gacaca, “one of the boldest and most original ‘legal-social’ experiments ever attempted in the field of transitional justice.” Others, however, criticize gacaca for the impunity it grants to crimes committed by the current ruling party, the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF), and its lack of due process and nonconformance to international fair trial processes. Most authors find that, for cases of sexual violence, gacaca is a wholly unsuitable forum.

In the context of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, arrests and imprisonment of Palestinian men in their early adulthood are common practice. The Public Committee Against Torture in Israel (PCATI) collected thousands of testimonies of Palestinian men allegedly tortured or ill-treated by Israeli authorities. There are many types of torture, sexual torture being one of them. This study is based on the PCATI database during 2005-2012, which contains 60 cases – 4% of all files in this period – with testimonies of alleged sexual torture or ill-treatment. It is a first in the investigation of torture and ill-treatment of a sexual nature, allegedly carried out by Israeli security authorities on Palestinian men. Findings show that sexual ill-treatment is systemic, with 36 reports of verbal sexual harassment, either directed toward Palestinian men and boys or toward family members, and 35 reports of forced nudity. Moreover, there are six testimonies of Israeli officials involved in physical sexual assault of arrested or imprisoned Palestinian men. Physical assault in most cases concerned pressing and/or kicking the genitals, while one testimony pertained to simulated rape, and another described an actual rape by means of a blunt object. The article provides illustrations of the various types of sexual torture and ill-treatment of boys and men in the light of existing literature, and recommendations.